Hello from Semarang, Indonesia! We are working with a local church here this month, going to various homes for house church. Each night one of our teammates is responsible for preparing a message. Some nights we may help with worship too. I go on Sunday night. This will be my first experience preaching, so please pray for me in that! It will be through a translator, which should be an interesting experience! I think it will help me not to go off on a tangent if I have to speak one sentence at a time.
Here in Semarang, thanks to the connections we have here, we are able to stay in a nice hotel for under our budget. It is a huge blessing, considering I saw myself camping every month. Last month 30 of us slept on the floor of the church and I was happy just being inside. Here we have a sky pool, real toilets AND toilet paper, a gym, and free breakfast every other day. But each month will look different, so in the back of my mind, I am still telling myself, don’t get used to this, haha.
Travel Day: It took us about 24 hours to get here from Bali. One hour taxi ride to the bus terminal, 10 hour bus ride (with a ferry ride in between- the bus drove onto the ferry), 3 hour wait at the bus terminal in Surabaya (from 3 a.m. to 6:20 a.m.), then another 7 hour bus ride to Semarang, and a taxi to the hotel where we stayed the first night.
-The bus only had a squatty potty, and so did all the rest stops. In fact, they are much more common here. In Korea, I could typically avoid them or hold it til I got to a real toilet. That’s not always possible in Indonesia.
-We were relatively sure our bus driver was going to kill someone. We spent more time driving towards oncoming traffic than we did in our own lane. It’s also apparently acceptable to smoke here while you drive a bus full of passengers.
-The rain became so heavy that the roads were flooded with, like, two feet of rain, but everyone just drove though it, or floated, not totally sure. Our bags that were in the storage area were pretty damp.
-At 12 a.m. the bus blasted music and handed us tickets. Turns out there was a free midnight buffet. We were all really tired and out of it, but no one in our group is the type to pass up free food.
-At the 3 a.m. bus layover I slept on the floor. Yes, it was dirty, but then again, so was I. I felt a little like a hobo though, and at that point I think I truly realized I was on the World Race.
-At our first hotel, the power went out because of all the rain, and the showers were cold and shared a floor with the squatty potties. So I took my headlamp and sandals to the shower. When the lights came on, I was so happy, even though the water was still cold, and the squatty potty was as close as ever. I’ve learned to find joy in the little things.
-All in all, though, while I’m sharing these stories because they are funny to me, it was really not that bad. Exhausting, sure, but a good bonding experience for me and my teammates and it makes where we are now that much sweeter.
So, we are here for a couple more weeks before heading on to Sri Lanka. My team has a shared love of a dessert called martabak, which is kind of like a crepe/pancake sandwich with bananas and chocolate (or various other fillings) in the middle. Every day we have morning prayer and team time, which one of us plans and organizes. Also, we got to attend an Indonesian wedding!
Prayer Requests:
-For our ability to learn and remember phrases in Bahasa (Indonesian)
-For us as we prepare our messages to share at the house churches
-No more rain on travel days
-For good health and no food poisoning
-For opportunities to share the love of God and the good news of the Gospel
Question of the Blog: If you were a mode of transportation, what would you be and why?
